Waldemar Kmentt

This busy tenor established his reputation early as a trusted artist in Mozart and Bach. Having a tone of voice much less sensuous than those of Léopold Simoneau or Anton Dermota, he non-etheless was frequently involved for stage shows, concert function, and recordings. Ultimately, he ventured as much right into a heavier repertory as Walter von Stolzing, a job he sang in the Bayreuth Event. Kmentt’s Metropolitan Opera debut — inside a speaking part — awaited the brand new millennium, but nonetheless brought encomiums from viewers as well as the press. Initial intending to go after a career like a pianist, Kmentt later on studied singing in the Vienna Academy of Music with Hans Duhan, Elisabeth Rado, and Adolf Vogel. In those days, he was chosen to tour Belgium and holland with students opera ensemble that included two performers who would later on achieve considerable popularity: tenor Fritz Uhl and bass baritone Walter Berry. Kmentt’s formal debut occurred in 1950 having a overall performance in Vienna of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 carried out by Karl Böhm. In 1951, he produced his professional stage debut performing inside a Wiener Volksoper creation of Prokofiev’s The Like for Three Oranges. The entire year following, Kmentt joined up with the Wiener Staatsoper. For the 1st 3 years of his tenure, the business performed in the Theatre an der Wien while awaiting reconstruction of the business’s own home. For the reopening from the Staatsoper in 1955, Kmentt was solid as Jacquino in Fidelio, posting the stage with such luminaries as Martha Mödl, Anton Dermota, and Ludwig Weber. That same 12 months, he produced his debut in the Salzburg Event performing Dandini in Pfitzner’s Palestrina. Mozart offered for his intro to La Scala in 1968 when he sang the name part in Idomeneo. Kmentt produced his debut at Bayreuth the same 12 months, performing Walter in Die Meistersinger. Through the many years of his primary, he also made an appearance regularly in operetta. When Kmentt steadily relinquished leading functions, he relocated into comprimario parts, like the Major-Domo in Der Rosenkavalier. Ironically, it had been another Major-Domo, that one in Strauss’ Ariadne auf Naxos, who finally brought Kmentt towards the Metropolitan Opera in springtime 2001. Among Kmentt’s jobs captured in documenting will be the tenor component in Bach’s St. Matthew Interest under Møgens Wöldike, his Froh under Solti, and his Ferrando with Böhm, taped live at La Scala.